Source: Australian Executive Government Ministers
PETER MALINAUSKAS, PREMIER OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA: G’day and welcome to the Adelaide Convention Centre for the second day of the Social Media Summit that is being hosted between the New South Wales Government and the South Australian Government.
I want to take this opportunity to thank Chris Minns for his leadership. Chris suggested the Social Media Summit, and certainly after a successful day yesterday, we now roll it to the second day of the agenda and look forward to hearing from a range of experts throughout the course of the day. One of them is Professor Simon Wilksch, who will be here a bit later on, who has been a keen advocate for change in this area, and has done an extraordinary amount of research through the Flinders University. I want to thank the professor for his presence here at this press conference. Really looking forward to hearing from Mike Burgess, who, of course, is responsible for ASIO here in Australia to hear about the implications of disinformation and social media and the impact on young people in the context of the future of our democracy here within Australia. I look forward to hearing Mike, along with a range of experts this afternoon.
But I am very, very grateful that we have representation of the Federal Government here who, of course, has displayed great initiative and leadership to pursue reform that will be applied throughout the country. To that end, I express my particular gratitude to Minister Rowland, who is here from Sydney in Adelaide today, and also Minister Aly, who is the Minister for Youth of course.
Michelle has been a keen advocate to making sure that the Commonwealth is getting ahead of the curve, to make sure we deal with this global challenge emerging, and whether it be through the age verification trial, the work of the eSafety Commissioner, but most recently a commitment to introduce legislation into the Federal Parliament that will put in place an age restriction for young people’s access to social media.
It is significant work and I want to thank the Albanese Government, but particularly Minister Rowland for leading this charge. I’m very grateful that she’s able to be with us today on the second day of the Summit.
We have taken this opportunity, though, as a State Government, to make sure that we’re not just focusing on the institution of an age limit for access to social media, but also doing the work around educating young people around what safe online behaviour looks like. Social media represents only one part of a young person’s access to the internet. There, of course, remains other unregulated areas where we know there is work to be done when it comes to educating children on how best to deal with the challenges that they simply will confront.
No one is suggesting for a moment that we should keep kids off the internet. Yes, we want to put an age limit in place in terms of their access to social media, but if we’re serious about their safety, we’ve got to make sure that they’ve got the skills and the capability to be able to deal with cyber bullying; to be able to understand what healthy messages are around body images; to understand what is illicit content, and really, is it safe for them, to give them the preparedness to know what to do and who to speak to, and if an online predator comes after them, we want to make sure that in South Australia, we’re leading the way in that regard.
That’s why today we are announcing that there will be a school based program that applies to all schools throughout the state of South Australia, within the curriculum, that gives access to children, to the knowledge and the tools about how to confront the challenges they’ll experience online. We want to make sure that in the South Australian education system, we’re not just keeping kids off their phones while they’re at school. We want to give them the tools about what they can do to protect themselves from the harms of the internet when they get home from school, and otherwise might get access to it. This is a consequence of evidence-based work. The Department of Education, through Minister Blair Boyer, who is with us as well, has been doing this work now for some months and we are now in a position to commit to this roll out starting next year. So from the school year 2025, children in South Australian schools will start learning, with the resources and tools that are required, what they need to do to be able to go online and do it safely. Without it being at the expense of their mental health, and then in turn their futures. I want to thank the Department, and particularly Blair for his hard work in this regard.
Chris put on a great show in Sydney yesterday. It was a thoroughly worthwhile exercise, and I just want to thank him for his partnership and his leadership to this end, and invite him to say a few words before we hear from Minister Rowland.
CHRIS MINNS, PREMIER OF NEW SOUTH WALES: Well, thanks a lot, Peter. It’s a real privilege to be here in Adelaide this morning with you, and Anne, and of course, Michelle as well. This is an important breakthrough when it comes to confronting an issue that’s facing parents, not just across Australia, but right around the world – and that is how do you deal with this creeping use of technology, particularly social media, that’s ubiquitous, that’s comprehensive, that every family has to deal with. When you look at the eSafety Commissioner’s report out earlier this week indicating that most young people are on social media, and the evidence that presented at the Social Media Summit yesterday indicated that 16-year-olds are spending three hours a day on social media. How do we as a community, not just a Government, but how do we as a community come together to protect our children, to protect the next generation? I think it’s been our view for a while now that this is a global, unregulated experiment on young people. This is the first generation that’s gone through this kind of access to social media, and as a result of that access to social media, exposure to what is often harmful content, what is often hurtful content, or bullying behaviour within social groups.
We need to be able to do something about it, and the two-day Summit has given us an opportunity, with South Australia, to get the issues on the table, to talk directly with parents, to arm people with both the latest facts as well as tips and strategies to get the best out of your kids and ensure that they’ve got the best start in life. I think most crucially, to progress legislative change so that we can deal with rapidly changing technology.
I want to give full credit to the Commonwealth Government for stepping up here and introducing what will be a globally leading change to regulation in the world. We think it will make a difference and spark or ignite a fire when it comes to a recognition amongst communities that social media is doing harm to young people that could sweep right across the world. It’s been resisted at every gate, at every step by Silicon Valley and the billionaires that own these companies. But that’s not a good enough reason to do nothing. At the end of the day, our obligation is to do no harm for young people, and if we get this right, technology can work for us rather than running and dominating all of our community and family life.
MICHELLE ROWLAND, MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS: Thank you so much, Premiers. The safety of our young people is paramount. Not only their wellbeing, but also their mental health. To that end, the Commonwealth sees the safety of children, especially in the online space, as a collective responsibility.
The Premiers will know that their frontline services are being impacted by the harmful implications that can arise from social media. Whilst it can be a positive tool in many respects, there are harms that come with it. The Premiers will also tell you that the mobile phone ban in schools, for example, has seen a definite change in behaviours. At the same time, the consequences of the harms of social media are impacting on their education as well as health systems and mental health systems in particular. It’s for this reason that the Commonwealth takes a collective approach, not only right across the Albanese Government, but also with the states and territories as well. All Australians should know that we are working as one towards the safety of our most vulnerable.
To that end, the Commonwealth has committed that we will introduce legislation this year to mandate a minimum age for access to social media. This is a commitment from the Prime Minister, and I am pleased that today we are announcing the legislative design principles that will underpin this approach. For example, we see the onus as being on the platforms, not on users or their parents when it comes to safety online. It’s important to incentivise the platforms to create less at risk platforms, less at risk apps, less at risk services. To that end, we look forward to working with industry to help achieve this goal. We know through recent developments that the platforms can, and they should, be doing more in this space. We will also be working with eSafety, who will be overseeing this legislative change. Importantly, we will continue to pursue efforts to make sure that the platforms are held to account, and do more. To that end, there won’t be penalties that will be imposed, as I said, on those children or their parents as users. But we will ensure, through our review of the Online Safety Act, that the penalties regime is fit for purpose. It’s important to note here, as I said, that this is a collective responsibility across Government. As I will outline today, this is one step in many that the Albanese Government is taking to keep young Australians safer online. The normative value of this is immense. So many parents are being overwhelmed by the amount of time their children are spending online, and what they can do as parents to help more effectively manage that – the normative value of this will be immense for those parents. So again, I thank the Premiers for convening this. It’s so important that the Australian people know that as one we have their back when it comes to keeping their children safer online.
PROFESSOR SIMON WILKSCH: Hi, everybody. I’m absolutely delighted to see the collaboration between the Federal and State governments, the respective leaders and the premiers on this issue. We heard this week that 84 per cent of eight to 12-year-olds are on a social media site in Australia. That is entirely unacceptable. I’m a clinical psychologist working with patients with eating disorders – if we wanted to try to create a way of causing eating disorders, it would be to use these kinds of platforms with children that age. We’ve seen a 200 per cent spike in 10 to 14-year-olds experiencing an eating disorder over the last 12 years. As someone who works in the clinics helping these families through this problem, I see the devastation this causes young people; the families, the toll it takes – and these are just in the area of eating disorders. We know across the board with mental health and other areas there is suffering going on caused by these platforms, so I completely support minimum age. I would like to see it get up to 16.
I also really welcome the announcement of funding towards school-based programs that will prevent these problems and really assist young people to be equipped to handle their online presence and be safe. I have a particular program, named Media Smart, for schools which has a very strong evidence-base.
It’s an eight lesson program designed to help young people be informed about those messages they see; to question how social is their experience on social media; just take steps towards taking care of themselves and others. So I’m really hopeful that that type of program can be made available widely, and thank you.
JOURNALIST: You talked about the onus not being on the users or the parents, but putting it back on the platforms. We’ve seen platforms be reluctant to make that change to ownership of platforms rather than the user itself. How is the Government going to enforce this? Is there going to be big fines? Or what’s the timeline here for platforms to adopt this change?
ROWLAND: Well, we are looking at a one-year implementation timeframe. But I think it’s important to note that even as we have seen recently with Meta’s announcement of a new Instagram teen product, that the platforms can do more in this space to create less at-risk services. So we want to encourage that. We want to incentivise those better, less risky services that they can actually produce. But the point is very valid when it comes to penalties for the platforms. Currently in the Online Safety Act, the maximum penalties for offences are less than $1 million, and these are actually not reflective of the sometimes litigious nature of these platforms, but also the amount of revenue that’s generated. So this is one of the specific areas that the independent review of the Online Safety Act is looking at, and I expect to have their findings in the upcoming weeks. But we are very mindful of that. We want to incentivise as well as provide that backstop through penalties, appropriate levels of penalties that make the platforms do better.
JOURNALIST: Are you expecting resistance from these platforms?
ROWLAND: Well, so two things there. The first is that the Online Safety Act has been in operation now for some years, and the industry is now accustomed to it. By and large, the social media platforms have a high rate of compliance with it. However, there are always instances where there is non-compliance or it is contested, and the fact that is contested again demonstrates that the Government considers that no company, despite its wealth, despite its multinational status, is beyond our laws. We will always assert Australia’s sovereignty in that regard.
The second point too goes to the fact that we want those platforms to be accountable, by having not only incentives but proper penalties in place, that ensures that transparency and accountability. We do not wish to punish parents or users in this process. That is something that needs to be made very clear. This is about the platforms doing better. We have an Online Safety Act that was basically designed as a complaint-based system about individuals, not the onus being on the platforms. That’s something that we are looking at changing through our review, but it’s something that we are also committed to in the design principles of this legislative change.
JOURNALIST: Minister Rowland, as part of this legislation, are you going to be advocating for better psychological support for young people who have suffered as a result of these tech platforms? Because hearing from the young people in there, that’s hand in hand with this legislation.
ROWLAND: Now, that is certainly valid. The other side of that, of course, too, is that a lot of young people do access support services now through social media. So it’s going to be very important for Governments and departments to work together to ensure that young people can still access those services, even if they are below that minimum mandated age. So those two points are very valid.
JOURNALIST: We’ve seen recent changes to Instagram. Do you think our Government’s push has led to that?
ROWLAND: It is pleasing to see that these Instagram changes occurred after our Prime Minister made that commitment. Now, whether or not there is causation in there remains to be seen. But we do know that incentivisation does work in this area, and I can give that example from when Minister Amanda Rishworth and I convened the first roundtable to regulate dating apps services, because the level of tech facilitated abuse and death was simply too high as a result of this occurring.
Amazingly, these multinational dating app platforms suddenly discovered new safety features that they were able to roll out. So we welcome any safety features that the platforms may be rolling out, but that does not mitigate the need to legislate in this space.
JOURNALIST: Premier Minns – the announcement today from the South Australian Government in curriculum and an adjustment there – could we see something similar to New South Wales and maybe even the mobile phone bans, etcetera.?
MINNS: Yeah, we’ve got a proud history of stealing good ideas from Peter, so why should today be any different? It seems like a good initiative to us. We flat out nicked the mobile phone ban from South Australia which was resisted when we were in Opposition. But I saw it in implementation over here, Peter came over to Sydney to talk to us about the positive benefits, and I have to say it’s a reasonably early stage in our Government’s tenure, but I think it’s the best decision that we’ve made.
Interestingly, if you speak to kids and parents and teachers, they’ll tell you that the big difference has happened during recess and lunchtime. Where kids put down their phones, they can actually speak with one another, play games, and interact at a human level rather than online. So it’s great initiative. I think this is a good way for federations to work – see something in operation somewhere else, steal it and put it in your own jurisdiction.
JOURNALIST: So the current plan to adopt more online safety into the curriculum from next year – is that something that New South Wales might be looking at as well?
MINNS: Yeah. Look, I don’t have an announcement today, but give us a bit of time. I think part of the process for a summit like this is you get the ideas out on the table, you can learn from them, steal them and implement them and ultimately get the facts on the table. These two- this summit, the two days that we’ve had in both Sydney and Adelaide has been, I think, a breakthrough in both policy change, but also getting the facts out on the table and invaluable. So I’d like to see more of it actually.
JOURNALIST: Is there the opportunity to take this then to National Cabinet as a joint collective then, if you seem interested in the idea to pursue it further, to maybe make it a bit more of a wider national problem, given that social media can happen anyway?
MINNS: Look, potentially. We’ve got a lot on our plate when it comes to the National Cabinet agenda, and states have to work and operate independently. Public education, the curriculum is a state based responsibility. We take that very seriously. Obviously, that’s our responsibility, but if we can spot a good initiative that’s working somewhere else, I’m not afraid to steal it.
JOURNALIST: I’ve got a question for Premier Malinauskas – what kind of fines would you like to see the federal legislation do for this?
MALINAUSKAS: Look, the Chief Justice French report, I think, lays it out pretty clearly that whatever the fine regime is needs to have a sufficient economic deterrence to make sure we change the behaviour of these social media companies. Now, economic deterrence is an established legal principle, and basically what it means is that capacity to pay should inform the size of the fine.
Now, when it comes to these social media companies, my word, they’ve got the capacity to pay. These companies are making an extraordinary amount of money out of the Australian market, which means if they break the law, the Australian jurisdiction, the fine should reflect that. In other words, it’s got to be billions of dollars. We certainly welcome the Federal Government’s not just interest but for the work that is already underway through the Online Safety Act.
JOURNALIST: Premier, you’re a father of young kids. How do you see this sort of legislation playing out in real time? Won’t kids find a way to get on social media regardless?
MINNS: It’s a really important question and it’s one that reflects, I think, a public sentiment. It continuously gets raised. Won’t kids find a way around the social media ban? Probably, but that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t be establishing the principle in a law that sets the community standard, that arms the parents with the ability to say to their children, no, you can’t do that because it is against the law. No different to drinking underage or smoking before you’re 18. I mean, we say to kids you shouldn’t drink if you’re under the age of 18 – that’s consistent across the country. Do kids drink underage? Of course they do. Do they sneak behind the shed and have a cigarette? Probably. But what we know is that a lot less kids do that as a result of us having a clear standard and a law that can apply throughout the land. Social media is no different. With even the mobile phone ban at schools, we were the first state to do a proper phone ban in schools, bell to bell, not having them at recess and lunch. Are there examples of kids sneaking mobile phones into school post the mobile phone ban? Yeah, of course there are, but they are the exception to the rule because now the rule is clear. No phones in schools. So we establish rules and principles and standards that- in the full knowledge that someone will break them but that doesn’t mean they’re not worthwhile because the majority of people tend to comply.
JOURNALIST: Premier, will you be taking this idea to National Cabinet? You’ve been very vocal in youth law and social media spaces
MALINAUSKAS: Look, I think and Blake and [indistinct]… necessary of it. In that education ministers’ forum, there is a constant sharing of ideas between states and also with the Federal Government around various initiatives that are being undertaken. This will be shared in that context. Chris is right. I mean, I think when it comes to National Cabinet, my view is we’ve got to be a little bit careful that we don’t load up a National Cabinet agenda, so we don’t end up focusing on the main structural challenges that we have within our federation. So I don’t think this will be one that goes through National Cabinet, but it’s certainly an idea that’s clearly going to be shared through the appropriate channels and hopefully gets taken up.
JOURNALIST: Would you like to see it adopted maybe through the Federal Government then maybe not through National Cabinet at all?
MALINAUSKAS: As Chris said, what we teach our kids in the schools is the responsibility of states. We’ve got a range of discussions on [indistinct] with the Cabinet at the moment around funding school regimes and the like. This is an initiative that we’re applying here in South Australia, but if it’s relevant and appropriate in other jurisdictions, that would be great.
JOURNALIST: Premier, what age will this new curriculum be rolled out to? Is it high school students and is it being done elsewhere?
MALINAUSKAS: Well, it starts next year. I might invite Blair to go into a bit of detail on that.
BOYER: Thank you, Premier. So it starts next year. It will be delivered at different ages or different year levels in high school, and each one will be adapted in a way to make sure that it’s actually age appropriate as you go up from year seven, year eight, year nine. I think Simon spoke really well about the kind of content that’s in there. Simon’s program is one of the ones already that is on the approved list here in South Australia. So the funding that we are announcing today to provide to schools so they can secure the services of Simon and other programs like that and come in and actually sit down with kids and talk through all these issues that we know come about because of the use of social media. So the important thing to do here, I think, though, is that what is taught and the kind of curriculum and detail in there needs to be different as it goes up from year seven all the way into the senior years, because as kids get older, they are dealing with different issues and the nature of their engagement with social media changes as well.
We need to make sure it’s evidence based, which Simon’s is, and make sure it’s regularly updated because the other thing I think here that is the real challenge that I’ve observed is that we’re on a burning platform here. I mean as we sit here having this press conference, there’s people outside here who seek to take advantage of young people through social media, whether it’s a scam or harassment or predators, they are constantly thinking of ways to get around the protocols and security features that we put in. Every day they are spending their time trying to get around the things that Governments do to keep our kids safe. So that’s why it’s really important that we use programs like Simon’s to make sure the information we’re giving kids is up to date. It also speaks to why we’re upgrading and updating the Keeping Safe: Child Protection Curriculum here in South Australia to make sure that it now includes things like AI, deepfakes and coercive control. We’ve actually done that work with the AFP, with the Australian Centre for Countering Violent Extremism and the eSafety Commissioner to make sure that what’s in our child protection curriculum is fit for the year 2024 and not still based on something that was an issue back in the 1980s.
JOURNALIST: You mentioned the extra funding to allocate this to bring programs in like Simon, what’s that going to cost?
BOYER: I don’t know a specific figure yet because we’ve- we’re going to roll it right out across all schools. That will depend exactly how many sessions that we actually provide. We’ll work with some of the providers like Simon to see that. But we’ll make sure that what we provide is not just age appropriate, but can reach all South Australian students, which I think is important as well. It’s also going to be some work to do there in the future to do that constant updating, because, as I said, those people who are seeking to, you know, get around the things that we are doing to keep kids safe are doing that every, waking minute. So we need to make sure that things that we do are constantly updated. And you know, brought into the year 2024.
JOURNALIST: So what will it look like in classrooms? Will it be a number of sessions with people and programs like what Simon has?
BOYER: So exactly right. So we have an approved provider list for the Department for Education. So there’s a number of providers who offer services like the ones that Simon does and schools are able to choose from that list of those providers and we will be funding them to do that and bring those providers in and sit down with students of all those year levels all the way up to year seven and offer the classes essentially. It’s all one on one basis, talking through all these issues and effective things they can do to protect their own mental health and wellbeing and have all those kind of deeper conversations, which as what we heard from the student panel today is needed, I think. It can’t be kind of a cursory tick and flick kind of part of the curriculum, because what these students are grappling with here is, incredibly complex, really complex stuff and changing all the time. So we need to make sure that the resource materials and support that our schools and teachers get is up to date. What we’re announcing today is making sure they have the financial resources to do exactly that.
JOURNALIST: What are the indicators here to know that this is starting to get traction and working?
BOYER: In terms of?
JOURNALIST: In terms of the application.
BOYER: Of the program?
JOURNALIST: Yeah, the program through the school?
BOYER: Yeah. Yeah. Good question. I mean, I always say that in my job as Education Minister, there’s nothing more powerful than hearing from students and premiers- Premier Malinauskas spoke with you well before I think around why the mobile phone ban was really important, even though it was going to be a very hard thing to do. Although now we’re talking about its success, I remember at the time there were plenty of who thought it was going to be very challenging to put in place. Are there still students who try to get around it? Absolutely they are, but the reason that is starting to drop in terms of the numbers of students we see who are trying to get a way around it, is because as those students this morning said, what they are finding is that when their classroom or the playground is free of mobile phones, they actually like the place more. The most powerful bit of advice I got or feedback I got from- was from a principal out in my way in the north eastern suburbs who said the playground feels like it did in the 1990s. As Kirsty said this morning, it’s kicking the football, playing sport, talking to each other and seeking more activities to do. So I think it’s that kind of feedback that speaks to how the kind of programs that we are funding today actually work and actually succeed and actually make the school and the classroom a place that kids want to be in, a place that kids enjoy.
JOURNALIST: I suppose just further to Josh’s question, who’s been consulted on these new reforms? Have the kids been part of the discussion?
BOYER: We’ve done a massive amount of consultation as part of the new Australian curriculum in South Australia, including the adapted South Australian part. I think 12,000 views people have taken into account. It’s the biggest consultation that the education system in South Australia has ever done. Students, classroom teachers, principals, industry groups, the employers, associations like Kirsty is the head of the Principals’ Association about what they want to see. I was fortunate enough to be part of some of the consultation groups that we held here.
JOURNALIST: Minister Rowland. The flights from Lebanon, how much did they cost?
ROWLAND: That’s best directed to the Foreign Affairs Minister. But I will say this, the Australian Government has been saying for some time that Australian citizens need to return to Australia. It is becoming increasingly difficult; the situation is becoming unstable. The Government has made provisions to ensure that Australian citizens are safe but as we have been saying for some time, it’s time to get out.
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